British Aerospace is close to concluding a study on whether to relocate Raytheon Hawker subcontract work from its Chester plant to Prestwick in Scotland.
BAe's Airbus division manufactures the wing and fuselage of the Hawker 800 business jet under a subcontract which was part of the deal to sell its Corporate Jets division to Raytheon in 1993. The Raytheon deal was extended by five more years in September 1996.
BAe says it is examining "the implications" of moving the work from Chester to its Aerostructures division at Prestwick. It adds that the study, which is "some weeks away" from conclusion, has been driven by the pressure on the Chester division to boost Airbus wing capacity and under-utilisation of the Prestwick site, which produces the AI(R) Jetstream 41.
Annual production of the 30-seat J41 has plummeted in the past year, from a high of almost 50 aircraft to just 12 aircraft this year.
The J31 is out of production and the ATP line closed two years ago, the uncompleted final four Jetstream 61s from that line now having been dismantled for spares.
Other work has been moved to fill Prestwick, including Avro RJ wing manufacture for BAe Aerostructures, and parts destined for the new Nimrod maritime-patrol-aircraft contract.
BAe Airbus, which employs around 2,800 people at the Chester plant, virtually all on Airbus wing manufacture, expects to recruit "several hundred" more employees over the next 18 months as production rates increase.
The last UK-assembled Hawker, an 800XP, will be completed during April by Raytheon at Chester. Final assembly of the aircraft, previously the 125 family, has been progressively transferred to Raytheon's Wichita, Kansas, plant over the past two years.
Source: Flight International
